Majority of Va. officials made errors, omissions on forms

Scott County, Va., Board of Supervisors member Randall “Butch” Kinkead is an expert in electric utilities, cable television, interstate transportation, banking, life insurance, alcohol distribution, textiles and just about everything else.
That is, if you take at face value the professional services he checked on this year’s annual financial disclosure form.
But Kinkead does none of these things. In reality, he works at a mining machinery company.
Kinkead admits he made a mistake and, unfortunately for any voters concerned about transparency, he is not alone.
A four-month investigation by the Bristol Herald Courier and News Channel 11 Connects found pervasive errors that raise questions about whether these forms are taken seriously and fulfill their purpose.
Nearly 216 of the 293 Southwest Virginia officials under review made errors or omissions on the form intended to help voters police conflicts of interest. That’s an error rate of 74 percent.
Along with Kinkead, incorrect forms were filed by school board members, city council members, sheriffs, judges, substitute judges, and even the people authorized to enforce disclosure laws – commonwealth’s attorneys.
“The document is intended to be a signpost,” said state Delegate H. Morgan Griffith, of Salem, who co-wrote portions of Virginia’s disclosure form. “People should know ... whether you’re renting out property to the county and you’re on the board of supervisors.”
The Herald Courier’s review of 2009 disclosure forms found that some officials:
n Turned in forms late or not at all;
n Filed outdated forms;
n Skipped entire pages;
n Failed to list gifts from constituents;
n Failed to name the offices held or government agencies they work for;
n Did not list the main source of income outside of their government posts;
n Omitted real estate they own;
n And excluded the gross income of various business ventures.

Wrong forms, questions
Joseph Rasnic, an attorney and substitute judge in Lee County, filed a page from an outdated disclosure form along with the current form.
The outdated page asks whether Rasnic’s individual securities investments are valued between $10,001 and $50,000, or are more than $50,000. The current form is more precise. It has the added question of whether any investments total more than $250,000.
On the old form, Rasnic checked that he has more than $50,000 in mutual funds through Edward Jones investments. It is impossible to tell if he has invested more money.
“I don’t think I have anything to report over $250,000,” Rasnic told the Herald Courier.
He also did not sign his form, though he did have it notarized.
Another common mistake was a pair of questions asking whether officials own any real estate other than their primary homes. Both questions are essentially the same, except that one is for state officials and the other is for those at the local level.
Often, both the state- and the local-level question were not answered. At times, only the state-level question was completed.

Errors of omission
The Herald Courier found that many officials skipped questions and even entire pages. Commonwealth’s attorneys, authorized to enforce disclosure laws, were not immune. Wise County Commonwealth’s Attorney Ronald K. Elkins skipped most of the second page of his questionnaire. That section asks whether he owns land, runs a side business, has any corporate partnerships or has been hired as a lobbyist.
“After looking over the Statement of Economic Interests I filed, I must have simply missed that page, or was thinking since my answer was no to all those questions, I did not have to continue,” Elkins wrote in an e-mail to the Herald Courier.
He did sign the bottom of the second page, however, affirming that he had answered everything truthfully. Below his signature is the stamp of a notary, making the form an official document.
Elkins is not the only official who said he left a page blank because he had nothing to report. However, most officials said they were confused.

No excuses
The confusion excuse is news to legal expert Phyllis Errico, a member of the nonprofit Virginia Association of Counties. Errico does the talking any time her group hosts seminars that include public disclosure laws.
So far, no one has complained that the disclosure form is confusing, Errico said. And nobody has professed intentions to shirk his or her duty of completing the form.
“My impression is that everybody takes it seriously,” she said. “After all, it’s part of their office as a public official.”
Still, some officials note only a vague recollection of their annual disclosure-filing duty.
Dickenson County Sheriff Bobby G. Hammons, when asked about omitting his total debt, was silent for several seconds before answering.
“Is that that thing we’re supposed to do once a year?” he asked.

Late filers
Some officials turned in forms days, weeks and even months after the Jan. 15 due date. One official who filed his form late was Kinkead, the Scott County supervisor who incorrectly stated that he works in more than a dozen business fields.
In two telephone interviews, he said that he took time to fill out the form and did not rush it.
“I just filled it out backwards,” he initially said of his mistakes.
Kinkead said he thought he was stating the services he receives. In other words, he does have a telephone and bank account, and receives services from casualty insurance companies, other insurance companies, intrastate transportation companies, trade associations and labor organizations.
Kinkead filed his report on April 8, nearly three months after the January due date. He filled it out several days after a reporter requested all of Scott County’s disclosure forms.
When asked in the first interview if he rushed through the form just to get it to the newspaper, Kinkead hung up the phone.
“I don’t have time for this,” he said. “You’re bothering me.”